1. Field of the Invention
Apparatuses and methods consistent with the present invention relate to managing addresses, and more particularly, to managing logical addresses in order to support a greater number of logical addresses of connected devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 shows a video system connected according to the High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) Consumer Electronics Control (CEC) specification. The video system of FIG. 1 is constituted by connecting a digital television (DTV) 10 to digital versatile disc (DVD) players 20-1 to 20-4 according to the HDMI CEC specification.
Video signals as well as control signals are transmitted and received between the DTV 10 and the DVD players 20-1 to 20-4. Accordingly, the DTV 10 and the DVD players 20-1 to 20-4 need to have unique logical addresses.
However, only a limited number of logical addresses are provided in the HDMI CEC specification. Additionally, logical addresses are pre-allocated according to a type of a device.
A table of logical addresses is shown in FIG. 3.
Referring to FIG. 3, if the DVD players are playback devices, logical addresses “4”, “8” and “11” are sequentially allocated to the DVD players.
In other words, if the DVD players of FIG. 1 are sequentially connected, logical addresses “4”, “8” and “11” may be allocated to the first DVD player 20-1, the second DVD player 20-2 and the third DVD player 20-3, respectively.
However, if there is no logical address to be allocated to the fourth DVD player 20-4, unregistered logical address “15” may be allocated to the fourth DVD player 20-4, causing the fourth DVD player 20-4 to be inactivated.
As a result, logical addresses can support only one TV, three recording devices, four tuners, three playback devices and one audio system, and it is not possible to support a greater number of devices other than those listed above.